


Wed in Hate

by Control_Room



Category: Dark Deception (Video Game)
Genre: Deals With The Devil, Gen, Inspired by the new skins, Not Romance, Past Relationship(s), Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-04
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:07:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27881214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Control_Room/pseuds/Control_Room
Summary: Doug realizes he needs to make a change for his family.Even if that damns him to be with what he thought he wanted forevermore.
Relationships: Doug Houser & Helen Bierce
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	Wed in Hate

When one’s sins appear before them at the start of death, most begin to cower in the fear of nightmares long gone, particularly those of regret, shame, and unfinished business. Some go back, if they are lucky, or unfortunate enough to get a chance to. 

Doug Houser was not one of those unlucky (or fortunate) people. 

When he saw Helen Bierce step out from the shadows, his faith in darkness revealed, he felt his eyes grow wide and his thick brows knit. 

Did she recognize him?

“Oh? Another one,” she remarked, in that manner so very like her own that no one else could have it. She spoke as if he were a fleck of dust on her dress, something to be noted, addressed, and then passed on. “How nice to have some company again.”

She always had been the social butterfly, back in the day, commandeering all events and bewitching the crowd.

“Come over here,” Bierce commanded. “Let’s have a look at you.”

He gravitated to her, his lips pressed shut. He would not fall for her lies again. He would merely do her tasks, get his wife and daughter’s lives back, and then pass into the void himself. 

“You disappoint me love, you really do,” she sighed, inspecting him. He tried to stand tall, forcing himself to ignore the pet name. That was just how she spoke. “So fearful. So many desires left unfinished. I thought you’d be bigger. Don’t look so confused!”

He was not  _ confused _ . Doug was embarrassed. She had said those very same words in another time, in other circumstances. 

“I know all of what you’ve got hidden in that brain of yours.”

Clearly not.

Riddle of heaven indeed.

***

A hundred years made no difference to them.

She had charmed him away.

A hundred years ago.

The stories and talk of her secretive prowess, it had enchanted him. He had grown up watching her movies, and she was a skilled actress. Her husband’s twisted practices did not diminish her powers in acting. Doug, many years following her disappearance, even though Even tried to convince him not to, went to that old abandoned manor. There was no one around, of course. 

Doug did not mind that at all. 

She had come to him in a dream, and told him that she would fulfill all his desires. He went to her manor, even if that dream was nonsense, he needed a fix, and he needed it desperately. 

“I’m surprised you actually listened,” a voice Doug had heard many times through the static grainery of a television set appeared in his ear as he lay in a guest room to sleep after cleaning the cobwebs from it. He shot up in the bed, and saw her sitting beside him, straight back and poised like a knife. “You do know what sort of dangerous position you are in now, don’t you?”

“I kinda need help,” he remarked, blinking rapidly, as if to clear this illusion from his mind. When she touched his arm, he realized she was there, and solid. “You told me you could help.”

“Oh, love, I can, but why should I?”

“Because then you’d have the rest of that ring all to yourself,” he promised. “I just need this one thing, that’s it.” 

She laughed, and it was a full laugh that both surprised him and made him blush. It was an awkward situation he was in. 

“Oh, Doug,” she sighed once her mirth expired. “I’d want a little more than that.”

“I’m not sure what I can give to your ladyship,” he replied, fidgeting on the bed, wishing he was wearing thicker pajamas, the air cold. “I don’t think you need money wherever you are.”

“No, I don’t,” she agreed, leaning towards him. “But there are more…  _ physical _ payments one could achieve. Especially one who is as handsome and appealing as yourself.”

“Uh, I don’t think I understand,” he lied, leaning back. Bierce looked identical to his late wife.. She scoffed. “Really, I don’t know what I can give to yo--”

A finger pressed to his mouth.

“You very well do. It gets so lonely there, sometimes.” she sighed, hand trailing down to rest on his shoulder. “Otherwise, well, I suppose I could take my leave now.”

“Wait, no!” Doug pleaded desperately. “I really need your help, Ms. Bierce.”

“Then will you pay me as I requested?”

“I… I’m a married man.”

“That didn’t stop you before.”

His ears burned, and his eyes watered with the force of the flush that surged up his cheeks. 

“Maybe you’re right,” he admitted. “But I’m trying to make a change. Maybe me and my wife weren’t meant to be together, but I was wrong to have abandoned her and Tammy.”

He alluded to her-- not meeting her gaze.

They looked the same.

Reincarnation perhaps? 

A split of a soul?

Did the worse half of Helen go to this woman, trapped in limbo, and he had gotten her better side and just cast her away?

He missed his wife.

Tammy was problematic, but they, together, could have had a good life, even with their daughter’s struggles. He should have stayed by her-- them. 

But now he was wed to a devil, and his sins loomed in the pews, cackling and cheering.

He would earn for his true wife and daughter a happily ever after. 

He would earn if for them.

***

Ready for another nightmare?

Doug pondered that question. Was he ready?

Did he have a choice?

His beautiful wife, his sweet wife, his darling little daughter, they came to his mind.

Ready or not, he would do this. For them. 

He did not nod, just proceeded to the portal. 

Helen watched him and shook her head. So what if she had sold her own soul and felt it fracture? So what if she was one part of a whole?

She did not care if she lost her so called “better half”. She was better without it.

Doug was not.

**Author's Note:**

> i think that Helen might be the worse half of Doug's wife, and her late husband was the better half of Doug.


End file.
